Evaluating and Working with Community Agencies: A Guide For the Principal

Schools can take the initiative in dealing with community agencies, says this writer, who offers some suggestions on how schools can help such agencies develop programs to meet student needs

\u3ci\u3eService Learning for All Students\u3c/i\u3e

We are witnessing a transformation in education. Again and again we hear that we are in times of diversification, collaboration, systemic change, and transition. Although these terms apply to cooperative efforts between groups, they stem from the realization that such efforts can efficiently support and prepare students to face increasingly complex challenges, opportunities, and problems. Service learning is a part of this transformation. Service learning rightly has been called the education of empowerment. It builds self-esteem, renews curiosity about learning, develops interpersonal skills, stirs leadership development, rekindles work and service ethics, and brings the world of careers closer to home. All students - elementary, middle, and high school, as well as special education - benefit from service learning. This fastback provides an overview of service learning and shows how teachers can incorporate service learning as an instructional methodology

Linking Learning and Service: Lessons from Service Learning Programs in Pennsylvania

Service is part of most schools. School staff and students participate in car washes, bake sales, dances, read-a-thons, and SK races to raise money for national and local groups and community-based organizations. Other students and teachers provide thousands of hours of more direct service, working at hospitals, providing support services at the Special Olympics, cleaning parks, assisting at shelters and food banks, providing tutoring services, running hotlines, and visiting the elderly. Young people and their teachers can also be found speaking at public hearings, serving on policy boards, and visiting elected officials to talk about the needs of the community

Service-Learning and the Dilemmas of Success

Service-learning as a methodology and a movement has achieved a quantum jump in the last few years. Nationally, it has been given strong impetus by the commitment of Congress and President Clinton. A few years ago, Congress authorized significant start-up funds to make grants to states. A number of states. already extensively involved in service-learning, received substantial grants. Pennsylvania, our home base, for example. received sufficient funds to support, initially, 44 school and community programs throughout the state. Last year. there were 66 programs: and this year. it will go over 90. And Pennsylvania· s growth of support is replicated in many states

Service-Learning Reflections: Update of Service-Learning in Pennsylvania

The Pennsylvania Service-Learning Resource and Evaluation Network based at the University of Pittsburgh supports service-learning programs.The network provides information, support, resources,and guidance. Its philosophy is to work with people by offering systematic data of a wide variety of types that help inform them about what they care about. The primary goal of the network is to help schools and community-based organizations to evaluate their service-learning programs